Gross-Rosen became an independent concentration camp in 1941. The camp eventually expanded to become the center of an industrial complex and to include a vast network of at least 97 subcamps.
![Major camps in Greater Germany, Gross-Rosen indicated [LCID: grr72020]](https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/images/large/1e1a90d8-17c3-4704-b09d-195bad62df43.gif "Major camps in Greater Germany, Gross-Rosen indicated [LCID: grr72020]")
![Gross-Rosen environs, 1945 [LCID: grr44030]](https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/images/large/6ad5b79e-680f-4208-a590-8be469605808.gif "Gross-Rosen environs, 1945 [LCID: grr44030]")
![Gross-Rosen concentration camp, 1945 [LCID: grr22044]](https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/images/large/ca104af8-d840-472b-91d5-b0af45abe206.gif "Gross-Rosen concentration camp, 1945 [LCID: grr22044]")
![Gross-Rosen subcamps, 1940-1945 [LCID: grr72050]](https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/images/large/3e9185d7-3f95-45ac-9e5a-14e445a04ca0.gif "Gross-Rosen subcamps, 1940-1945 [LCID: grr72050]")
![The commander of Gross-Rosen, SS-Obersturmbannfuehrer Arthur Roedl, at his desk with a photograph of Adolf Hitler hanging on the ... [LCID: 36214]](https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/images/large/145cb1ff-23c8-4a47-9431-7cd39bef2a88.jpeg "The commander of Gross-Rosen, SS-Obersturmbannfuehrer Arthur Roedl, at his desk with a photograph of Adolf Hitler hanging on the ... [LCID: 36214]")
The commandant of Gross-Rosen, SS-Obersturmbannfuehrer Arthur Roedl, at his desk with a photograph of Adolf Hitler hanging on the wall. Gross-Rosen, Germany, 1941.
Item View![Commandant Arthur Roedl and SS officers visit the Gross-Rosen concentration camp's quarry. [LCID: 36223]](https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/images/large/dcd4776b-474b-4d4a-955f-ffd01d55f5eb.jpeg "Commandant Arthur Roedl and SS officers visit the Gross-Rosen concentration camp's quarry. [LCID: 36223]")
Commandant Arthur Roedl (center) and SS officers visit the Gross-Rosen concentration camp's quarry. Gross-Rosen, Germany, 1941.
Item View![View of the stone quarry in the Gross-Rosen camp, where prisoners were subjected to forced labor. [LCID: 55760]](https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/images/large/69eeea0c-ac0c-42ff-8ddb-bf8457bf46cd.jpeg "View of the stone quarry in the Gross-Rosen camp, where prisoners were subjected to forced labor. [LCID: 55760]")
View of the stone quarry in the Gross-Rosen camp, where prisoners were subjected to forced labor. Gross-Rosen, Germany, 1940-1945.
Item ViewAfter Germany invaded Poland on September 1, 1939, Siegfried fled with a friend. They attempted to get papers allowing them to go to France, but were turned over to the Germans. Siegfried was jailed, taken to Berlin, and then transported to the Sachsenhausen camp near Berlin in October 1939. He was among the first Polish Jews imprisoned in Sachsenhausen. Inmates were mistreated and made to carry out forced labor. After two years, Siegfried was deported to the Gross-Rosen concentration camp, where he was forced to work in the stone quarry. In October 1942, Siegfried was deported from Gross-Rosen to the Auschwitz camp in occupied Poland. While there, Siegfried tried to use his experience as a pharmacist to save ill prisoners. As Soviet forces approached the Auschwitz camp in January 1945, Siegfried was forced on a death march from the camp. Those prisoners who could not continue or keep up were killed. Siegfried survived.
Item ViewAfter Germany invaded Poland on September 1, 1939, Siegfried fled with a friend. They attempted to get papers allowing them to go to France, but were turned over to the Germans. Siegfried was jailed, taken to Berlin, and then transported to the Sachsenhausen camp near Berlin in October 1939. He was among the first Polish Jews imprisoned in Sachsenhausen. Inmates were mistreated and made to carry out forced labor. After two years, Siegfried was deported to the Gross-Rosen concentration camp, where he was forced to work in the stone quarry. In October 1942, Siegfried was deported from Gross-Rosen to the Auschwitz camp in occupied Poland. While there, Siegfried tried to use his experience as a pharmacist to save ill prisoners. As Soviet forces approached the Auschwitz camp in January 1945, Siegfried was forced on a death march from the camp. Those prisoners who could not continue or keep up were killed. Siegfried survived.
Item ViewThe Germans occupied David's town, previously annexed by Hungary, in 1944. David was deported to Auschwitz and, with his father, transported to Plaszow. David was sent to the Gross-Rosen camp and to Reichenbach. He was then among three of 150 in a cattle car who survived transportation to Dachau. He was liberated after a death march from Innsbruck toward the front line of combat between US and German troops.
Item ViewIn March 1939, when Hana Müller (later Bruml) was 16 years old, Nazi Germany occupied her hometown of Prague, Czechoslovakia. Like other Czech Jews, Hana experienced persecution and discrimination under Nazi rule. In August 1942, she was sent to the Theresienstadt ghetto, where she worked as a nurse. More than two years later, in October 1944, German authorities deported Hana to Auschwitz-Birkenau. At Auschwitz, she was selected for forced labor. After a few weeks, she was sent to Sackisch, a subcamp of the Gross-Rosen concentration camp. At Sackisch, Hana was forced to work in a German factory making airplane parts for the Nazi German war effort. She was liberated in May 1945.
Item ViewGerda Weissmann Klein (1924-2022) was born on May 8, 1924 in Bielsko, Poland. Following the German invasion of Poland in September 1939, Gerda's brother, Arthur, and other Jewish men were ordered to report for forced labor. Eventually, Gerda and her parents learned that this had been a ruse. The men had actually been deported east in freight trains and forced across the border into Soviet occupied territory. In Bielsko, Nazi German authorities imposed anti-Jewish measures. Eventually, Gerda and her parents, Helene and Julius, were imprisoned in the Bielsko ghetto.
In June 1942, when the Germans liquidated the ghetto, Gerda was separated from her parents. She was sent to the Bolkenhain labor camp, where she was forced to work in a textile factory. From there, she was transferred to several other camps before being forced on a death march. American soldiers liberated her in early May 1945, in the Czech town of Volary. In 1946, she married Kurt Klein, one of her liberators. Klein was a German Jew who had immigrated to the United States from Germany in 1937. Gerda's parents and brother did not survive the Holocaust.
Item ViewBarbara was born in the province of Arad in northern Transylvania, Romania. She went to school until the Hungarian army occupied the area in 1940 and she was no longer allowed to attend. After the Germans occupied Hungary in 1944, discrimination against Jews intensified. Barbara and her family were forced into the Oradea ghetto. She worked in the ghetto hospital until she was deported to the Auschwitz camp. At Auschwitz, she worked in the kitchens to receive extra food. She was deported to another camp, and later forced on a death march. Toward the war's end, the Red Cross rescued Barbara. She returned to Arad after World War II and worked as a biochemist.
Item View![Death marches from Gross-Rosen, January 1945 [LCID: grr72060]](https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/images/large/16f1a13d-9e2b-4c30-8460-edfddd85a54a.gif "Death marches from Gross-Rosen, January 1945 [LCID: grr72060]")
![International Tracing Service boxes containing documentation about Gross-Rosen. [LCID: 43573]](https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/images/large/68948953-a305-445b-b1eb-370ed79fde84.jpg "International Tracing Service boxes containing documentation about Gross-Rosen. [LCID: 43573]")
International Tracing Service (ITS) boxes containing documentation about Gross-Rosen. The archive was established by the Allied powers after World War II to help reunite families separated during the war and to trace missing family members. Bad Arolsen, Germany.
Learn more about the ITS.
Item View
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